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Lebanon's Only Male Belly Dancer Hopes to Break Some Taboos by Jessie Deeter and Anne Sengès Through the machine-pumped smoke the figure reveals itself to the crowd, hips writhing in circles, hands "voguing" as the ringing Arabic music picks up the pace. Cheers go up as Mousbah turns to face the audience, a long silver chain whipping around his neck as he dances. There is no mistaking the man in the tight white polyester pants and long filmy white-with-silver-patches v-necked shirt beneath the haze. A patch of dark chest hair is visible from the third row. This is what they came for. Everyone knows Mousbah Baalbaki, Lebanon's only male belly dancer. His parents thought that he should play football. They told young Mousbah that belly dancing was not for men. Traditionally, belly dancing was reserved for whores and harem girls, not women from respectable families, and certainly not men. Although Lebanon is a modern country of several faiths, it is still grounded in tradition, and Mousbah came from a traditional Sunni Muslim family in the South of Lebanon, the most traditional part of the country. Nonetheless, from pre-adolescence the Lebanese boy always felt the rhythm. Ever since he followed his mother and sisters to parties full of Arabic music and dancing, all he wanted to do was dance. It wasn't a popular decision. "Here we grow up thinking men shouldn't dance Arabic," says 27-year-old Mousbah Baalbaki. Wearing a striped tee-shirt, long shorts and sunglasses on his head, gripping a cell phone in one hand, Mousbah looks more like a handsome Lebanese businessman than what he is, a dancer causing a small revolution. He stands with one foot in Europe and one in the traditions of his homeland. Next Page...